Vojtech Kinsky was born in Sahy, Hungary and became an accomplished linguist in Hungarian, Czech, German, French, Italian, Ancient Greek and Latin. He also spoke Malay and had studied Cantonese. Growing up on the farm of his Jewish parents, he gained his elementary education in Hungarian and, when the border town where he was born became Czech in 1918, continued his studies in Czech. He gained a Doctor of Philosophy degree in Economics in Berlin and a degree in law in Prague. He left Prague in 1939 for Singapore (via England) where he mastered English. After the fall of Singapore he fled by riverboat to Indonesia with the manuscript of Dwarfing of Man, the only possession rescued.
In Australia he was at first able to find work only as a storeperson before he went on to found his own stationery company. He spent his spare time writing as well as painting and sculpting. One of his paintings is reproduced in Landscape Art of the Blue Mountains, edited by Hugh Spiers. He left fiction, drama (one play in German and one in Hungarian) and poetry in manuscript. These are now held by the Mitchell Library (State Library) of New South Wales. He was unable for find publishers for his writing in Australia during his lifetime.
